


wrists get tired (rewriting futures)

by angxlsgrxce



Category: Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Ben Parker Dies, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hands, Hurt May Parker (Spider-Man), Hurt No Comfort, May Parker (Spider-Man) Needs a Hug, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Protective May Parker (Spider-Man), THANK GOD THAT'S A TAG LITERALLY THAT'S ALL THIS FIC IS ABOUT ;DFGHJKSBFG'SD;FKG, but there's a little comfort!!, may parker is a good parent, well. he's already dead in this but it's about grief, why isn't that a tag. shocking. give may parker the credit she deserves.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:22:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28010853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angxlsgrxce/pseuds/angxlsgrxce
Summary: There’s a crack in the sidewalk outside their apartment building; she hops over it automatically, years of tradition—of paint-stained fingers tangled with hers, of his crooked grin and glasses held together with tape, of laughter every time she purposefully stepped on the jagged split in the pavement that matched the smile on his face, of kisses that tasted like oranges—overwhelming her. For just a second.or, may parker finds herself again, in a son who's more broken than whole.
Relationships: Ben Parker/May Parker (Spider-Man), May Parker (Spider-Man) & Peter Parker
Comments: 8
Kudos: 19





	wrists get tired (rewriting futures)

**Author's Note:**

> i do not know what this is, to be honest with y'all, but i absolutely _loved_ writing it. i really wanted to do an introspective piece on may, i guess dkfjhglkdfgnfjkghk
> 
> i listened to [careful hands by sleeping at last](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8mmmtP9ObA) on repeat while writing this it captures the exact vibes of this fic so i recommend listening to it while you read!

May’s flip-flop heels slap against wet pavement, heat radiating in nearly-visible waves off the ground and soaking into the air, air that’s as thick as the soup her mother used to make her when she was sick. Sweat drips down the back of her neck, tiny strands of hair coming loose from the ponytail that’s already managed to last her a twelve-hour workday at the hospital. Thank God for rubber bands, even if they’re hell to get out. She’ll probably have to get Peter to cut it, if he’s still awake. 

She hopes he’s not. 

A train rumbles underneath the sidewalk, sending another rush of hot air up through a nearby grate to meet her. It smells like Ben’s unwashed gym socks and rat shit and everything in their fridge at home, probably; old egg sandwiches and tuna fish and a half-eaten jar of kimchi.

God, she hopes Peter ordered dinner before he went to bed. She hopes he’s in bed. 

Streetlights reflect their sickly yellow light—miniature moons to replace the absence of the real one in a sky blotted with pollution—in the pools of water that are inevitable with the unevenness of the concrete in their area; the area she calls home.

There’s a crack in the sidewalk outside their apartment building; she hops over it automatically, years of tradition—of paint-stained fingers tangled with hers, of his crooked grin and glasses held together with tape, of laughter every time she purposefully stepped on the jagged split in the pavement that matched the smile on his face, of kisses that tasted like oranges—overwhelming her. For just a second. 

May lets go of them just as quick as they come. 

It’s not the time for them, those sepia-tinged memories that are creased at the corners, faded in the center, stained with tears that she can’t scrub out no matter how hard she tries, darkened with the touch of Death’s hand. Not when Peter’s upstairs waiting for her. 

She hopes he’s not. 

The selfish part of her hopes he is. 

He doesn’t come out of his room anymore. 

The room that stays locked every night, has stayed locked since the night she lost her past, present, and future no more; the closed door a silent message that speaks louder than any word he’s said since the night she lost her past, present, and no longer future; a message that forms a wall between them, a wall she can’t break down, can’t break _through_ without the key, and she’s gone months with an empty hand; words come few and far between, for Peter, now, and each one is food she hoards like a starving woman since the night she lost her future.

Since the night Peter became the only future that mattered. 

The few times May does see him, there are bruises on his knuckles. Bloodstains on his clothes. Crescents under his eyes that are darker than the sea during a storm. 

Ben took her to the beach once. 

The button for the elevator cracks when she jabs her finger against it. They should move out. They can’t move out. She stares at the broken piece of plastic still pressed to her skin; her skin pressed to it, like she can’t pull away, like the heat has fused it to her body, melded them together in ways she can’t change. It’s an off-white that’s stained enough that it should be suspicious. She doesn’t care. When the elevator door opens, her finger drops away; the bottom half of the button falls onto the carpeted floor. 

Her reflection looks out at her from the warped metal of the door; she’s all streaked colors, a faceless ghost masquerading as a person. It’s cold when she touches it, the streak that’s supposed to be her hand matching the movement. She doesn’t know what to do with her hands anymore, when there’s nothing for them to hold. 

Metal groans as the LEDs that make up the digital numbers above the door flash to form a blocky _2_ , then a _3_ , then a _4_. The grainy fluorescent lights above her flicker for a split second; the veins in her hand look bluer than usual, rivers of oil slick under her skin, _poison_. 

The car lurches to a stop at _5_. 

May shoves her hands—nail polish chipped, cuticles bitten, skin dry—into the pockets of her Hello Kitty scrubs and steps out onto their floor. 

Scuff marks decorate the walls on the way to the end of the hallway where Peter’s waiting—she hopes he isn’t—and she stops at the one shaped like a child’s shoe print. It’s at waist level, against the doorjamb of Mrs. Elizabeth’s, and she still remembers the day it appeared. The boys were six, hands dusted with sidewalk chalk and hair unruly, bare knees marked with grass stains and tiny sneakers caked with dirt. It was the first time Peter had laughed—something that sounded like sunshine leaving his tiny body when Flash’s shoe had come flying off as he kicked at the air—since the night he lost his past, his present, but not his future, in a plane crash that no one predicted, except an absent God. 

They should go to temple on Saturday. 

She should invite Flash to go with them. 

He’s the one person who’s been able to get a sentence of more than three words out of Peter since the night they lost the soul to May’s body, the mind to Peter’s heart, the future to their present. It’s ironic, that May couldn’t, but the boy, who speaks to Peter with words sharp as glass, who hadn’t spoken to Peter for two years before the night everything imploded with someone else’s finger on the trigger, who holds himself together with splints made of popsicle sticks and hastily-taped on masks, could. 

But then again, Richie always could get Ben to speak, even on the days when the silence was deafening. 

Tears spill over, unbidden, unwanted, _needed_. The hand that used to have purpose comes up to wipe them away before they can fall. 

The apartment door is locked, because Ben isn’t there to wait up for her anymore, and Peter can’t, shouldn’t, won’t. 

May hopes he has. 

It’s with trembling fingers she unlocks the door, sets the keys onto the linoleum kitchen countertop with its perpetually sticky residue, picks up the empty Chinese takeout container to throw away, tugs weakly at the rubber band in her hair until it hurts, closes the cracked window with the weight of her body, rubs her face in the darkness of the empty kitchen. 

It’s with trembling fingers she turns on the lights. 

Peter’s door is open. 

The room is empty. 

A tapestry of emotions rips through her, woven with threads of fear, created on a loom of death, a perfect portrait of grief. She can’t lose another future. 

“Peter,” says a voice that used to belong to her, “Peter!” 

A noise from the bathroom. A familiar noise, _too familiar_ , the sound of metal against tile, a needle falling to the ground—a pin dropping to break the silence—the same sound she heard when she was eighteen. And when she was nineteen. And twenty. Bare feet resting on a colorful bathmat, hand on Ben’s bicep to hold him still as she painstakingly sewed his skin back together, extra needles on the edge of the sink on the verge of falling to the floor. 

Bile rises in her throat. 

“Peter,” she hears her voice say again. 

Light appears through the crack under the door. 

“I’m—I’m in the bathroom, don’t come in! I’ll be out in a second!” 

The door is unlocked. 

Peter, wearing nothing but a pair of faded gray sweatpants with a peeling logo that’s barely recognizable, sits in the bathtub, the plastic shower curtain decorated with cartoon fish shoved hastily aside. There’s blood on the curtain. Blood on his hands. A hole in his stomach. 

When his eyes meet hers, they’re full of guilt. 

It’s the same expression he wears every day. She hadn’t recognized it until now. 

“May—I’m sorry.” 

“Shh, baby,” she whispers. “It’s okay. It’s not your fault. It was never your fault.” 

The needle in his hands falls to the bottom of the tub. 

May picks it up. 

And under Peter’s red-rimmed gaze, her hands find a purpose again. 

**Author's Note:**

> i hope y'all enjoyed, find me on tumblr @ angxlsgrxce and please leave me a comment telling me what you thought!!!! 
> 
> remember that you are loved 💛


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